Sixty Years And Forever
by Sarah August
Summary: The time comes for Elena to wake up. Stelena. Short story.
1. Chapter 1

**Sixty Years and Forever**

 **By Sarah August**

 **Notes: Based after Season 8 of TVD. Short story.**

She woke up.

We knew it was soon time. We knew she'd be waking up. But who should go to her?

By the time the question was answered, it had been forty-eight hours since Bonnie Bennett-Carson had passed away. Forty-five years of marriage, and a large family, Bonnie had lived the life that Elena Gilbert had never had the chance to live.

We all had moved on. Time passed, and the relationships between those who remained, had changed with time itself. Death had closed the door on the friendships of Elena's extended family.

Matt had died on his family farm, in Kansas, far from Mystic Falls. An old man, surrounded by his children and grandchildren. Elena would have been happy for her lone, normal, human friend. He lived a happy life, making up for the hand life had dealt him, while growing up. A mother and father, who both abandon him, and losing his only sibling and sister, far too soon.

Elena had been taken to a woman's shelter. I knew we had waited too long to go to her. I shouldn't have waited for Damon. He had longed to see her. Not thinking of much else, especially these last ten years. But Damon wasn't here.

I knew what that might mean. Damon had made his decision about becoming human, or remaining a vampire forever. And it wasn't the decision that Damon had promised Elena that he would make.

Would he show up to tell her the truth, or leave it for his little brother to say? Stefan suspected he would get left holding the bag again. He always did.

He was taken to her room, by the site manager, after showing her the wallet size picture he had carried of her since their high school years. The picture was now worn, almost black and white looking. But you could still clearly make out their faces. Happy, and in love. Stefan put the picture carefully away.

"Do you know her name?" The manager asked.

Thinking nothing of it, I said: "Elena Gilbert," Stefan said.

The manager knocked at her door and then opened it. Inside, there sat Elena Gilbert at a bay window. She turned and smiled at me, expectantly. Time and space stopped, and I was back in Mystic Falls again, with that girl, with that face. "Elena," I breathed.

"You know me," Elena said, crossing the room, shaking his hand.

"I could never forget...," I spoke, and then paused. As happy as I was to see her, I remember a cruel irony. Elena, even nearly sixty years later, still wasn't mine to want.

Wait.

 _You know me._

Elena had no idea of who I was.

The realization was enough to make me feel faint, even sickness. After everything that she'd been through, Elena Gilbert had survived. But fate was funny that way. Even vengeful. Bonnie had warned them all, so often. They should have known.

You don't mess with the laws of nature. Nature always finds a balance.

Elena had died at the age of eighteen, turning into a vampire. She then cheated fate again when she took the cure. And then once more, when she was cast into a sixty-year sleep. Never aging a day.

Fate finally caught up with her.

She'd live, but with no memory of her life before her long sleep.

"Yes," I caught myself. "We were _old friends_...I heard about what happened, and I had to come. We...we went to _high school_ together," I finished effortlessly.

I had gone, just for her.

It _had all been for her._

"They say it was a car accident," Elena told him uneasily. "I was found, by the road, close to Mystic Falls."

"It was near the old Salvatore mansion," added the manager. Who then left them alone, after seeing the look on Stefan's face. One of pure regret.

They had waited too long. Elena had to crawl out of her coffin alone. No wonder she couldn't remember anything. The trauma of it all. Sixty-year sleep, and then suddenly alive again. Elena had went to that sleep knowing she'd awaken to find most of all of her loved ones dead. Maybe Elena didn't want to remember that every single person she had loved in her life almost was dead.

"Mystic Falls..." I said softly. "You were from there, you know."

Elena blinked in surprise. "I was? Are my family there?"

I didn't even know what became of Jeremy. He had left town after saying goodbye to Elena. No one knew where he had gone too. And if they did, they were likely dead.

"You said your parents died in a car accident, when you were sixteen. It had been just you, and your brother..." I trailed off. I had to tell her the truth. I couldn't let her believe that no time had passed. Even Damon...I had to tell her about my brother too.

"Grayson and Miranda," Elena breathed softly, in obvious remembrance. "They adopted me..."

"Yes," I replied, still hesitating. Would it hurt her to tell her the truth?

"And you're Stefan..." Elena reached out, touching my face.

She remembered me.

"Elena," I began, stepping away from her touch. "There's more that you should know."

She remembered.

I stop myself from caring about that. I couldn't get caught up in it. I couldn't get caught up in her, and how easy it would be to forget that my brother ever existed.

Elena had fallen in love with Damon. I remind myself. She had loved my brother despite being in love with me. Don't go there again. Damon had to know she was awake, and Elena had to know about him.

My words escape me as her lips find mine.


	2. Chapter 2

_**Three Years Later**_

"Take the cure, Stefan," Elena snapped, trying again to force the vial of her blood, into my mouth. "Dammit, Stefan, you need my blood...you're going to die, if you don't take it..." She then whispered, her voice breaking with emotion.

"No," I finally managed, spitting out my own blood from my mouth. I felt myself slipping away, going out of her reach. After three years of standing by her, watching her rebuild her life, Elena was ready to do this herself. "Elena, you need to wait, for him...Damon..."

"No, I don't," Elena nearly cracked, hating this old argument now. "He never came back for me, Stefan. Damon never kept his promise to wait for me, and I know why. He doesn't want the cure, Stefan...you did, and you still do. Take it..."

"No."

"Stefan, we're nearly out of time...stop fighting me, and take the damn blood. It's been three years, Stefan. Finally, be honest with me, tell me why you stayed here. Why didn't you leave me too?"

"I wanted to keep you safe, until Damon..."

"No," Elena shouted hotly, cutting me off. "You don't get to do that now. Not now. Why, Stefan?"

"Because I..." I stopped myself from saying it. I had over sixty years of practice, and I was damn good at lying when it came to how I felt about her. My brother's girl, and my first true love. "Elena...I loved you then, and I..."

"Stefan, stop fighting it. It's been sixty years, Stefan. How much longer do I have to wait, to hear you say it? Elena pleaded. She knew it was my time, and we didn't have much longer. I couldn't drink the blood If I tried. The stake was in too deep. "Tell me..." She urged again. My resolve was broken when I met her eyes.

I saw it. She loved me. It never really went away. Elena had to do the things she did. She had to break away from me. She had never explored how she felt for my brother, and then finally she gave in. And it was over for her. Elena would likely always love Damon. But it was over.

Because of how she felt about me.

"Elena, I love you...it was always you..."

She laughs, almost madly. Then smiles that one smile, that one which was meant just for me. Always me.

"Stefan, give it a chance...try and drink it..." She urges again, when the lights start to go out. "For me..."

"It won't be enough blood..." I remind her.

"But maybe it will be just enough," She pleads again.

Elena, human...always so full of hope. And I had none for myself.

I finally take the damn blood.


	3. Chapter 3

"It never should have been like this..." Damon spoke. He had watched the small funeral service from a distance. "She should have had the life that she deserved..."

"You never thought about that, when you didn't come back."

"Stefan..." Damon turned to face his brother. He'd been the sole person which had attended her funeral, save for a few friends, which barely knew her. "I loved her, dammit. Don't you believe for one second that I never did..."

"But you never came back, and Elena was left to believe the worst about you. She thought you gave up on her. That you took back your choice to become human..."

" _I did take it back_ ," Damon admitted reluctantly. "I loved her _more than anyone_ I ever knew in over two-hundred years, Stefan...but when it came down to it, I chickened out. I couldn't be what she wanted me to be. I didn't want to give up being what I was, and I still don't. I don't regret what I did. Elena needs someone like her, _who is like her._ I'm never that good, _Stefan_. I can't be with her like that. I don't want the _big white house_ and the _fenced in yard_. I don't want to have _my own family_...that was _you._ It was always _you."_

"Why did you come here, Damon," Stefan said after a long silence. "You know that Elena is really alive...you knew she's been awake for over three years, and you still never came to see her... why now?"

" _I never came_...do you really think that I would never come _back for her_?" Damon sounded sincerely upset. "I was here, the day you went to _see her first._..I heard _everything_ , and she..."

"She _kissed me_..." Stefan replied for him. He felt guilty. He felt guilty for the choice he had made that day about his brothers girl. His brothers girl, but his _own first love_. He had decided that nothing on earth would make him ever stop fighting for Elena Gilbert. Even if that meant stepping on his brothers feelings. " _Damon_ , you should know, we never got together, after that. _Not until_...recently."

" _You made her_ wait for me..." Damon surmised. His voice was broken.

Stefan bowed his head. He had made Elena wait for Damon. A wait that she reluctantly did. Three years without any word or reason to believe that Damon was still in love with her.

" _She waited sixty years,_ Damon, to be with you. _Time passed for her_ , in that sleep. She was self aware..."

Damon let his tears fall and he turned away. "I can't hear it, Stefan..."

"Go to her... _we're leaving town tomorrow night._.."

"No," Damon shook his head.

"Damon, don't let me go home and tell her about this. Instead of going to see her, you attended a funeral that you knew was fake..."

"Stefan, you don't want me to go and see her...because if for even one second, she gives me second thoughts, I won't hesitate..."

" _Damon, just._..do it for her. Please. If anything, Elena needs the chance to say goodbye to you. She's wanted nothing but the chance to see you again. She loved you for a whole lot of years, and she's missed you...that much I know."

"What if she..."

"Damon, no more back and forth. That's over for her. Just do this, one last thing. For the _mere human_ in your life that you refused to say goodbye too."

Finally, Damon notices. He's surprised, and hurt sounding.

"You took the cure..."

"I was dying, and Elena refused to give up. It's why she gave me her blood..."

It had never been a question before that. She was human, and I was a vampire. A dynamic we were used too. I had never wanted the cure, even years ago. When I held it in my hands. I could only think of her. I had wanted Elena to be human, not me. But here we all were...

I was human. I died a vampire, and then I came back... I came back for her.

"I woke up after dying...we never could figure out why it worked. I never took enough..."

"I'll see her," Damon replies, after a cool silence. He decided he rightly hated the new bond that I shared with Elena. I could tell by the look on my brothers murderous face. I had ended up with Elena, despite everything. I had really accepted the fact that I had lost her forever. But fate had other plans for me. "I'll go to her...when would be the best time...?"

"Now, the kids should be in bed soon."

Damon stopped at that last reveal. I fully expected my brother to physically try and rip my head off, but something had changed in him. He looked happy to know that Elena Gilbert was the mother for two kids. Even if I was the father.

Damon gave me a final smile, and one last nod, before taking off into the evening dawn. I waited a few hours before going home that night. I never seen my brother again.


	4. Chapter 4

Sixty-nine years, almost, and no longer a vampire. She still looked the same to me. Elena Gilbert.

She was a teenager when we first met. When I was still fully amerced in my quest to reunite with Katherine. I was clueless to the fact I had just met the love of my life.

Katherine had that affect on people. She had a way of making you see only her, and nothing else around you existed. I had been in love with Katherine then, heart and soul. I would have been blind to anyone. Even to someone who was Katherine's doppelganger.

I didn't care that Elena looked exactly like the woman that I loved. I wanted the real Katherine Pierce, and no imitations. Stefan was the opposite of me. He fell in love with Elena at first sight. I should have known that Elena wouldn't wait for me.

She likes to believe that she had. I can tell by the look she gives me after sixty-nine years apart. Elena is hurt by the decision that I had made, and it dawns on me that maybe Elena really did love me. I just wasn't something she'd been curious about. Elena had really fallen in love with me seventy years ago.

I can tell by that look on her face. She still bore hurt from the damage that I had done to us. I left her waiting for sixty years, and then I had given her a big bunch of nothing in return. I did it because of that day I seen her with my brother. It was then I knew what I had done to them.

I had interfered with fate. I had never stopped it. After the mess with the travelers, I had wanted to believe that I had stolen Elena away from fate itself. She was mine, and she loved me. It didn't matter that she had fallen in love with my brother first.

But when I saw them together, and the look on my brothers face. I had stolen away the woman my brother loved only for a brief time. I was too late.

Stefan, again, was there first for Elena when she had needed him most.

Destiny had finally reared it's vengeful head, and I officially lost Elena the moment she decided to kiss my brother, and stop waiting for me.

"Damon," She speaks and I'm forced back to the present.

Not only did I lose her, Elena is now my brothers wife.

We're standing in the upstairs hallway of her and Stefan's house. I had sneaked a peek at Elena being mother to two little kids. Jeremy and Miranda Salvatore adored their mother. This life suited her most. Elena Gilbert was never meant to be a vampire, and neither was Stefan Salvatore.

"I had to see," I guiltily admit to her. She smiles, much to my relief.

"They are beautiful, Damon," Elena whispers with obvious pride.

"They look a lot like you," I reply back. She smiles again.

Elena. I will never forget her.

"Elena...I just wanted to tell you, I'm sorry. I should have came back and told you what I wanted..."

"You should have," Elena quietly agrees. "But here we are now... Damon, I forgave you a long time ago...I will always love you. But I had to live my life over again. I'm human, and I couldn't wait too long... And I didn't want to wait...not when I met Stefan again...It was like everything made sense again after one very long sleep...I knew it was the right choice to make..."

I smile again. I couldn't argue that. It was true. It always had been true. Stefan had a way of making everything right for Elena. I couldn't top that. Not only was he right for her, he was more deeply connected to Elena than I ever would be. It was over.

Stefan was right.

Time had decided for Elena who she was meant to be with. And it wasn't me. I had always known the answer to that question.

"I think you make a lot of sense," I reply, and Elena is stunned, but happy to hear it. "I just wanted the chance to say goodbye Elena...this life, _it's yours and Stefan's.._."

Elena smiles and then embraces him quickly. She lets him go, and she remembers that she is happy in her new life with Stefan. She refuses to dwell on the loss of Damon anymore.

No apology he had could make her start all over again. She had let him go.

It still stings sharply. She had day dreamed this moment, so many times. But she was really over Damon. It was alright to be his friend. For Stefan, their two children, and herself.

Fate had brought her back to Stefan. She had once loved Damon so much.

She blinked through an awkward silence and then Damon was gone from sight.

That was it.

She forced back unshod tears, before smiling and nodding to his absence. Damon did not want to be cried over just as much as she fought not to cry over him.

Elena finally had the life she had always wanted. There was no reason to grieve anymore.

 **THE END**


End file.
